The importance of studying personality traits and pain in the oldest adults

The importance of studying personality traits and pain in the oldest adults
Ekdahl, Anne W.
2015-04-01 00:00:00
In this issue of the Scandinavian Journal of Pain Lena Sandin Wranker and coworkers [1] report on the influence of different personality traits on the perception of pain with focus on older adults and also differences between the two genders with regard to personality trait and pain.Older people often suffer from symptoms such as depression [2], fatigue [3], sleep disorder [4], and pain [5] which is the focus of this paper. Community-dwelling older people have reported pain prevalence of between 20% and 79% [6,7], and pain causes older people a considerable amount of suffering. Sandin Wranker and co-workers invited 2312 persons between 60 and 96 years of age, and of the 1403 who responded, 65% of women and 36% of men answered yes to the question on whether they had had any ache or pain during the last 4 weeks. Pain was moderate or severe in 86% of women and 79% of men who responded “yes” to this question [1].Earlier studies described pain as underdiagnosed and under-treated [6,8] and found that independent of clinical diagnosis, 25% of older people did not receive analgesic treatment for pain, and people older than 85 were even less likely to receive analgesics [8].
http://www.deepdyve.com/assets/images/DeepDyve-Logo-lg.pngScandinavian Journal of Painde Gruyterhttp://www.deepdyve.com/lp/de-gruyter/the-importance-of-studying-personality-traits-and-pain-in-the-oldest-QVke8GWDMN

The importance of studying personality traits and pain in the oldest adults

Abstract

In this issue of the Scandinavian Journal of Pain Lena Sandin Wranker and coworkers [1] report on the influence of different personality traits on the perception of pain with focus on older adults and also differences between the two genders with regard to personality trait and pain.Older people often suffer from symptoms such as depression [2], fatigue [3], sleep disorder [4], and pain [5] which is the focus of this paper. Community-dwelling older people have reported pain prevalence of between 20% and 79% [6,7], and pain causes older people a considerable amount of suffering. Sandin Wranker and co-workers invited 2312 persons between 60 and 96 years of age, and of the 1403 who responded, 65% of women and 36% of men answered yes to the question on whether they had had any ache or pain during the last 4 weeks. Pain was moderate or severe in 86% of women and 79% of men who responded “yes” to this question [1].Earlier studies described pain as underdiagnosed and under-treated [6,8] and found that independent of clinical diagnosis, 25% of older people did not receive analgesic treatment for pain, and people older than 85 were even less likely to receive analgesics [8].